Felicity Blunt and Stanley Tucci

At the Cinema Society’s New York premiere of The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, actor Stanley Tucci, who does a sensational job as the movie’s purple-haired TV presenter, said that he and his wife, Felicity Blunt, had recently left their 1700s homestead in Connecticut to live in London. “I don’t have a special fireplace, nor do I have an arrow and a quiver,” he said wryly. “We just have a little fireplace,” explaining that they had scaled down in Great Britain. “Everything’s smaller.”

Rob and Marisol Thomas

In a spectacularly short dress at the premiere, Marisol Thomas, alongside her rock star husband, Rob Thomas, declared, “I’m a big fireplace person. We have four. My favorite? The one in the family room, which is brick.”

“And it’s not one of those gas ones,” added her husband. “We have to light the wood. I make a hell of a fire.” But Mr. Thomas drew the line at chopping kindling, “God, no,” he replied. “But I buy it well.”

Photo: Clint Spaulding/PatrickMcMullan.com

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Andy Cohen

Bravo’s Andy Cohen, host of the campy chat show Watch What Happens Live, apparently learned a thing or two at summer camp. “I’m the best at lighting fires. I went to Jewish boys’ camp. You put the kindling under, dry wood on top, and then the bigger logs. It’s not rocket science.”

Photo: Clint Spaulding/PatrickMcMullan.com

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Patty Smyth and John McEnroe

John McEnroe, wearing a skinny black tie, arrived at the American Museum of Natural History 2013 gala with his rocker wife, Patty Smyth. “I’m always searching for the perfect fireplace,” said Smyth. “I would have to say that the one in our apartment in New York is our best.”

“I was going to say that,” chimed in McEnroe. “We’re always trying to do better, but it’s a hard thing to change.”

Alexi Ashe and Seth Meyers

SNL head writer Seth Meyers and his wife, Alexi Ashe, indicated that her sister, designer Ariel Ashe, would be reworking their fireplace. “We have a fireplace, but we’re about to have a nicer one,” Meyers said.

“The old one is really generic,” Ashe explained. “I like cement. My sister just designed one in Martha’s Vineyard that is cement with wood pressed into it—really pretty.”

“And then all we need is to find someone to live with us who knows how to light a fire,” quipped Meyers.

Karlie Kloss and Derek Blasberg

At the Museum of Natural History, supermodel of the moment Karlie Kloss, on the arm of AD scribe Derek Blasberg, answered, “I don’t have one at my new apartment, but at my family’s house in St. Louis, I’m the pro firemaker. I was also a Girl Scout, so I really know. First you crunch up the newspaper.”

“She was a Brownie,” explained Blasberg. “I bet you were a cute Brownie.”

“Did they have uniforms in your size?” inquired a perhaps overly Inquisitive Guest.

“She wasn’t six foot one when she was five,” snapped Blasberg.

“Close,” said Kloss.

Photo: Jonathon Ziegler/PatrickMcMullan.com

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Paulina Porizkova

Paulina Porizkova, another towering model, conceded that she had two fireplaces but that they were no beauties. “The person who had our apartment before us remodeled in the ’80s. And we’ve been thinking of adding a mantel for 30 years. When you have an old house—ours is 1850—I believe in going with the style of the house. I don’t believe in buying an old house and making it modern. We’re taking it back to the original, little by little, and I’d love a big hearth.”

Tina Fey and Jeff Richmond

Actress and comedian Tina Fey, host of the American Natural History Museum gala, and her husband, the composer and producer Jeff Richmond, offered contrasting views of their fireplace. “We’ve never used it,” Fey said, “because it’s always too warm on Christmas.”

Taran Killam

At the museum gala, SNL star Taran Killam indicated that he and his wife have a lovely brick fireplace at their home in Los Angeles. “We painted the brick dark gray,” he said. “And out in the backyard, there is a ’60s-era stand-alone fire pit.”

Killam said he used to be an expert at lighting a fire. “I grew up in Big Bear, California,” he explained. “There was a time in my life when I could start a fire with a sock and a rock, but now it takes 14 newspapers and a broken chair to get any kind of a flame.”

Photo: Jonathon Ziegler/PatrickMcMullan.com

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Baz Luhrmann

Director Baz Luhrmann, also at the museum, pointed out that he grew up in a very small town in Australia. “Making the fire was a nightly ritual back at our farm, so I have a really intense relationship with fire. For my 51st birthday, my wife bought me a fan for our fireplace, to make it draw properly. And when we lived in the south of France we had a fireplace like the one in Citizen Kane, so big you could walk inside of it.”

Kyle MacLachlan

Actor and winemaker Kyle MacLachlan described himself as highly skilled at tending fire. “I’ve got a very nice fireplace at my home in Los Angeles,” he said. “It’s an homage to a corner fireplace that my grandparents had at their home in Vancouver, Washington. “I remember it as very cozy and brick—just a beautiful place to hang out.”

“I’m very good at lighting it,” MacLachlan suggested believably. “I honed my fire-lighting skills under the tutelage of David Lynch. He was an Eagle Scout. You need a very sharp hatchet and knife, some wood, kindling you can shave. The goal is to use one match.”

Photo: Monica Schipper/FilmMagic

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Gilles Mendel and Kylie Case

As they arrived at the museum, Kylie Case noted that her designer partner Gilles Mendel’s best fireplace has an elegant Parisian mantel. “But I’m really a modernist, more Saarinen,” said Mendel. “I like more of a clap-on, clap-off sort of fire,” he suggested with a smile.

“When I met Gilles, he had the most beautiful fireplace screen,” added Case. “It was curved glass, transparent, with chic fireplace tools.”

“It’s all about transparency,” Mendel agreed. “Glass, something very modern.”

Case and Mendel are pictured here at the Fashion Institute of Technology Gala.

Photo: Patrick McMullan/PatrickMcMullan.com

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Martha Stewart

On her way into the museum, Martha Stewart mentioned her hand-carved, pink-granite fireplace at her house in Maine. “It’s a giant stone fireplace that draws beautifully. And we only burn white birch, because white birch burns fast but clean. Few ashes are left. It has a beautiful gilded mirror above it, beautiful candlesticks. . . . It’s lovely.”

Photo: Gary Gershoff/WireImage

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Roger Waters

Yes, Pink Floyd front man Roger Waters wrote the rock opera song “Another Brick in the Wall,” but he described his favorite of his fireplaces, on the way into the museum dinner, as Swiss rustic. “Yes, it’s in Switzerland, I’m ashamed to confess,” answered Waters when pressed. “Modest in size, slightly raised off the floor,” he continued. “You can sit there holding a glass and be happy.”